Pair in 2011 fight face new charges

2 got probation for attack during beer bash in cemetery

Updated 9:24 pm, Monday, March 31, 2014

Two former Troy High School football players who were part of a 2011 gang attack that injured two Catholic Central High students at an underage drinking party returned to court on unrelated charges.

Tyrek Brace, 21, was arraigned Thursday on charges he violated his probation from the sentence he received in 2012 connected to the attack. Brace is accused of failing to report to his probation officer. He also has a contempt charge pending against him for allegedly violating an order of protection connected to an unrelated North Greenbush assault case and will likely face a violation for that as well, officials said.

Brace, who was arrested last week, appeared in jail garb and pleaded not guilty before Judge Debra Young. He was sent back to the Rensselaer County Jail pending a written bail application.

Also back before Young was Stephaun Grinage, who was sentenced to five years of probation in 2011. He was arrested in February on charges of misdemeanor sexual misconduct, according to the Rensselaer County Sheriff's Office. He was before Young last week for violating probation. Grinage received youthful offender status in the gang assault case, so those records are sealed.

A former standout Troy High football player, Grinage would have been a running back and linebacker for the team in 2011 if not for his arrest and dismissal from the team. The first-team Large School All-Area selection by the Times Union as linebacker in 2010 would have been the team's most experienced and accomplished returning varsity player.

The attack occurred just before midnight June 27, 2011 during a beer party in Elmwood Cemetery when five Troy High students, three of them football players, attacked two Catholic Central teens who were invited by Troy High girls.

One teen suffered a concussion and was knocked unconscious, and another suffered a broken jaw after one of the students hit him with a tree branch, which sparked the group attack, officials have said.

They attackers were sentenced to five years of probation after pleading guilty to second-degree attempted gang assault, a felony.